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Friday, 20 November 2015

Welcome to Stick It Down's November blog hop! Several of our design team members have created projects to share with you using any of our past SID sketches. If you've never participated in a blog hop before, you'll "hop" from blog to blog to visit each designer's page and project. You'll leave a comment at each stop along the hop. The hop will end right back here where you started, where you can comment to let us know you've completed the hop and you're entered to win the grand prize. You have until Monday November 23 at 11:59pm to complete the hop. The winner will be announced on or before November 25.

We have several prize packages and one grand prize lined up! Paper Wings Productions is generously sponsoring our blog hop and is offering a $25 gift certificate to the online store!

Paper Wings Productions is owned by Carrie Edelmann Avery. All of the PWP stamps are produced in the USA and are made using the highest quality of materials. You can check out the PWP online store to see the red rubber cling stamps and the clear photopolymer stamps!

Are you ready to get started? Here is the order of the hop, in case you get lost:

I am very thankful that my Dad and I are so close and that we enjoy such great times together. Here we are at our local village Annual Turkey Dinner and Fireworks. It was the 63rd annual dinner and we came away from the table stuffed to the brim and thrilled to see so many friends.

The sketch is from Stick It Down designed by Brenshevia and first revealed in July of 2014.

Thursday, 19 November 2015

We are so proud to be Joaquin's "Muskoka Grandparents". As such we look forward to his schools' annual Grandparent's Day.

Grandparents are treated to a morning of song and dance, more exercises than I care to participate in, and classroom activities that make me feel like I need to be schooled, not him.

Just like the kids, recess is my favourite time. This year Joaquin and his BFF teamed up to squire us around the playground. When I asked them if I could take a picture I didn't expect what I actually got. I thought perhaps a nice shot with the school name in the background. Boy was I wrong.

The two stood side by side, and, as I said "smile", those hams launched into a riotous game of funny faces and laughter. I got the best pictures ever! Shows they know what makes better shots than I do.

The layout is from the November Stick It Down
double page sketch, designed by Ali Gage. I so enjoy participating with Stick It Down
as one of their double page team Members.

The title, of course, just had to be "BFF forever".

I didn't use a lot of embellishment as the lengths of rulers and the zig zag pattered strip seemed to give it enough of a 'fun at school' type look.

There
is also a great single page and card layout on the site. On the 1st of each month you'll find the three sketches. Whatever your
fancy
there's a sketch for it. Be sure to link up your design. The link is
active until the end of November.

It
would be great to see your design chosen by the Design Team at the end of the
month. With your design chosen you'll be invited to be one of our
Guest Designers.

Saturday, 7 November 2015

Port Dalhousie, a small hamlet along the shores of Lake Ontario between Hamilton and Niagara-on- the-Lake, traces its history back to first three Welland Canals, when it was used as the terminus on Lake Ontario for vessels plying the lakes.

The canal ran from Port Dalhousie on Lake Ontario to Port Robinson on the Welland River. A southbound ship would enter the canal at Port Dalhousie, sail up the canal to Port Robinson, pass through a lock into the Welland River, sail down the river to Chippawa, where oxen would tow the ship against the flow of the Niagara River to Fort Erie.

Eventually Port Dalhousie became part of the City of St. Catharines.

My layout is of Lakeside Park and the lighthouse area of Port Dalhousie. The beach is beautiful. It's been in existence since 1920. It's so well maintained that from any vantage point it looks like a perfect postcard.

I used the Scrapmuch? sketch from October 30th designed by Laura Whitaker. I love sketches that allow you 5 or 6 photos. It makes the decision as to which photos to use so much easier. There's 2 sketches up on the site now and linking up either of them, or the two yet to follow this month, makes you eligible for the November draw.

If you are ever near St. Catharines it's well worth dropping by Lakeside Park in Port Dalhousie, especially if you have a bathing suit at hand.

Wednesday, 28 October 2015

One inescapable beauty in Niagara-on-the-Lake is its superior gardens. Everywhere you go there are the most glorious gardens. Each planting boasting such a variety of flowers that it's doubtful one person could name them all. Well I certainly couldn't anyway.

Wednesday, 21 October 2015

It doesn't matter how many times you visit Niagara Falls, the sheer force and beauty of what Mother Nature can create leaves you in awe.

The day I visited the falls this summer was a bit on the cloudy side. The benefit though was that the cloud cover brought out the rich teal and blue colours of the water beautifully.

I further emphasized those colours by using matching cardstock in the layout and keeping the page very simple so that the focus was immediately the photograph.

The inspiration for this layout was from the October 12th sketch at Let's Get Sketchy. They've a sketch every Monday so there's lots of opportunity to be creative every month.

I was lucky to find paper with Niagara Falls written on it. I didn't need to worry about a title. As I mentioned, to keep the focus on the photo, I used very little embellishment. The brass lock and keys on the lower corner and the matching brass brads on the upper corner did the trick for me.

Tuesday, 20 October 2015

Meet Eddie the horse. He doesn't like to share the limelight so when someone pulls out a camera he has to get as close as he can to it and smile. I'm in this picture somewhere but it's hard to see me with Eddie's teeth at the forefront.

Not only does he need to learn to share when there's a photo, he needs to see a dentist.

On my birthday, which I spent in Niagara-on-the-Lake, I went for a carriage ride. It's been one of those things I've wanted to do and not gotten around to. That's how I met Eddie. The driver let him pick the route, and a nice one it was, but his price for a scenic ride is constant adoration and praise. He's a ham.

Smiling Eddie

The sketch is a great one from Scrapmuch?, by Laura Whitaker. Each Friday you'll find a sketch at Scrapmuch? designed to tempt your talents. This one seemed perfect for Eddie. There's lots of layers to him too.

I love this title I got from Silhouette. In my scrappy world I more often than not offset the letters with two or three colours. I think it adds 'pop' to my title.

So if you're ever in Niagara-on-the-Lake and want a photo of your carriage ride, I'd think about giving Eddie a miss. On the other hand if you want a horse with character and a will of his own, Eddie's your guy.

Monday, 19 October 2015

This is the last layout in my Vancouver 2012 album. Actually it turned out to be two albums and 80 layouts. It wasn't until I started putting it all together that I realized what a massive project it had turned into.

I've just come back from this years' vacation and promised myself no more than one album. Let's see how that works out. :)

The Rockies were so beautiful. Travelling up Whistler in the gondola gave me an fabulous opportunity to get pictures from a great vantage point.

The layout is from the October Stick It Down double page sketch, designed by Ali Gage. I so enjoy participating with Stick It Down as one of their double page team Members.

For embellishment I used some "Sea to Sky" Highway 99 stickers I purchased at a shop on the mountain. I mounted them on chipboard so I was able to layer them in a grouping. I also added a BC button. It's amazing what trinkets you can find in gift shops to use on a layout.

Having fallen in love with this particular Bo Bunny paper from its Safari collection, I had to do the title in it as well. With layers of brown and grey behind the letters, the shaded "tin" look of the paper really popped.

There are also great single page and card layouts on the site. Whatever your fancy there's a sketch for it. Be sure to link up your design. The link is active until the end of October.

It would be great to see your design chosen by the Design Team at the end of the month. With your design chosen you'll be back with us as one of our Guest Designers.

Thursday, 8 October 2015

What great fun we had apple picking near Collingwood. It was a gorgeous day, and, being Xavier's 1st birthday, there were a lot of the family around to help pick.

One of the things that captured the attention of the two little ones was the pumpkin patch. Ashlynn checked the pumpkins over, and pronouncing them quite alright, sat to enjoy her apple amongst them.

Xavier, who loves anything that makes noise, bravely approached his first pumpkin and gave it a pat. It returned his pat with that 'thump' kind of echo, as a pumpkin does, and he immediately went musical. Every pumpkin got a pat. You could say Xavier treated us to a rather unique recital.

Saturday, 19 September 2015

By far, my favourite birds at the Bloedel Conservatory were Ruby and Kiwi. They are two brilliantly coloured eclectus parrots.

At first I thought they were both males because of their bright colours. I was quite wrong. For the eclectus parrots the females are more brightly coloured with red, blues and sometimes violet and lavender while the males are mostly emerald green. Ruby, the female, had a black beak and Kiwi's, the male, was a “candy corn” orange and yellow beak.

The other interesting difference to other parrot species is that the structure of their feathers is so fine that it actually resembles hair rather than feathers.

Kiwi was the better talker of the two. Actually, his voice sounded a bit like Dustin Hoffman’s character Ray Babbitt in the movie Rainman when he got going.

Totally fascinating and beautiful birds.

The layout is from the September Stick It Down double page sketch. I so enjoy participating with Stick It Down as one of their double page team Members.

There are also great single page and card layouts on the site. Whatever your fancy there's a sketch for it. Be sure to link up your design. The link is active until the end of September.

Picking embellishments was interesting. I loved how the sketch suggested different groupings that really pulled the pages together.

I chose circles with a dream catcher overlay, to go with feathers, for the ones behind the two photos, and branches to mimic the sweeping groups of circles.

For the title I chose multi-toned grey and blue paper and did a bit of journaling as I've done with other of the pages highlighting birds of the Conservatory.

The second is the Scrapping For Fun challenge that required the layout to be made up of "Brand Name Scrapbooking Paper". I've used Bo Bunny and American Crafts in my layout.

The third is from Lasting Memories who has a weekly challenge that works in with their September theme of "Techniques and Titles. This layout is for the challenge "Use those punches - Title after a book, song or movie". I've used question marks and the title is after the Reba McEntire song "Is There Life Out There".

You have until the 28th of September to create your layout using this sketch and post it on the Scrapmuch site to have a chance to be chosen by random draw for a prize.

Tuesday, 1 September 2015

Art...not the kind you find in a museum but the blue-gold macaw kind. Art is a large South American parrot with blue top parts and yellow under parts. He's a member of the large group of Neotropical parrots known as macaws and the last of my bird pages in the Bloedel Conservatory of my Vancouver album. Yes the last. The birds are done. :) You've been very patient. I just wasn't able to choose between them so had to do them all.

The sketch is the September single page from Stick It Down, designed by Purvi. I like that the sketch suggested a variety of papers for the horizontal bands. What a great way to use of some leftover paper pieces. I just dug through my scrap treasures to find colours that matched Art and his surroundings.

Stick It Down also publishes a great double-page sketch as well as a fabulous card sketch on the 1st of the month. This gives you all month to design your creations. You should try accomplishing all three this month. Each will give you a chance to be selected by the Design Team as a guest Designer next month.

Wednesday, 26 August 2015

Granville Island is such a fabulous spot to visit. I loved watching the outdoor entertainers perform outside the Public Market. The Market is one of those places where you'll find whatever you can imagine and then some.

I'd travel there by Little Blue Ferry and enjoy a full day. Although I did this several times on my vacation I barely scratched the surface of everything the Island had to offer.

The inspiration for this page came from the August 15th sketch from Stuck?! designed by Laura Whitaker. You still have a few days to create your own design and be in the running to be a prize winner chosen by random draw.

I traded the circular elements for stars. the stars matched my nautical themed paper. Being an island what else what you use? A few lines of zigzag stitching to simulate waves and it was done. This Stuck?! sketch is definitely one I will be using again.

Have a great day and remember, always be on the lookout for an adventure.

Wednesday, 19 August 2015

I just absolutely adore this new tradition of taking a picture of baby each month of its first year. Only when you see one month after another do you really understand the concept of How Time Flies.

These photos are months five, six, seven and eight of my great-nephew Sam's first year and the inspiration for this layout. What a difference just four months made. I swear he went from baby to little boy in that brief period of time.

The sketch is this month's double page sketch from Stick It Down. Check out all the samples of layouts done with this sketch at Stick It Down. I'd be very surprised if you couldn't find some exciting inspiration for your own layout. Be sure to link up that layout by the end of the month. If your layout is chosen you will become the featured designer for the following month. Now that would be very exciting.

Being a little boy, it seemed like scribbles were perfect for the sketch's suggested circular elements/embellishments. Adding time pieces fit the theme.

I enjoyed playing with my Silhouette Cameo for this layout. I found a childlike font and added a clock to create my first title with combined words and picture. Several offsets made the clock and title 'pop'. It turned out to be easy to do so I know I'll be using this technique more often.

I hope you drop in at Stick It Down and find you enjoy creating with this sketch as much as I have.